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I suggest that all code is a liability, rather than a debt per se. This assumes all things can be usefully viewed through the prism and language of economics (

by Jedd 7y ago

I suggest that all code is a liability, rather than a debt per se. This assumes all things can be usefully viewed through the prism and language of economics (though my gut feel is few things can or should be).

aaronchall 7y ago
Liabilities are debts. > liability: a thing for which someone is responsible, especially a debt or financial obligation. According to the balance sheet equation, > Assets = Liabilities + Owners Equity Certainly all code is a liability - it must be at least understood and maintained from time to time (80% of lifetime cost is in the maintenance). And while an accountant might also mark it an asset - not all code is an asset - and we recognize that fact when we delete for badness or disuse - or rewrite it to make extending and maintaining it easier.
- Jedd 7y ago
  As intimated, I'm not sure that the fuzzy language and world of economics is the best way to view such things, however ... I'd accept that debts are a subset of liabilities, but not that 'liabilities are debts'. A debt implies an externality, while a liability implies some generic exposure -- it's that which I focus on when considering (all) code as a risk to an organisation. I suspect, however, that we agree on the fundamentals. There's some cost and risk to developing and trying to maintain any code base, and accepting that can usefully inform development and operations work better than thinking of code as a (near-)risk-free asset.
kweinber 7y ago
The accounting world considers code an asset and allows you to amortize its creation. Making progress in the world is fighting against entropy. Just because it is hard to fight the disorganizing efforts of the universe doesn’t mean that your output is a liability.
RickSanchez2600 7y ago
Code is a liability it can be hacked if not written securely. It can be out of date if the language changes or Windows changes and the company upgrades, which means parts of it need to be rewritten. I used to program COBOL on IBM 370 DOS/VSE systems they later went to Visual BASIC on Window 3.1 PCs. The conversion took a long time and most code had to be rewritten because COBOL is not BASIC. Management didn't care about that, they just wanted a working project. We all did our best going overtime without pay and working weekends to meet deadlines. COBOL was a liability when they wanted to convert to Visual BASIC. There was liability to convert the code, convert from DB2 to SQL Server on the database end.
- dfilppi 7y ago
  Overtime without pay is financial debt.

by Jedd 7y ago

aaronchall 7y ago

Liabilities are debts. > liability: a thing for which someone is responsible, especially a debt or financial obligation. According to the balance sheet equation, > Assets = Liabilities + Owners Equity Certainly all code is a liability - it must be at least understood and maintained from time to time (80% of lifetime cost is in the maintenance). And while an accountant might also mark it an asset - not all code is an asset - and we recognize that fact when we delete for badness or disuse - or rewrite it to make extending and maintaining it easier.

Jedd 7y ago
As intimated, I'm not sure that the fuzzy language and world of economics is the best way to view such things, however ... I'd accept that debts are a subset of liabilities, but not that 'liabilities are debts'. A debt implies an externality, while a liability implies some generic exposure -- it's that which I focus on when considering (all) code as a risk to an organisation. I suspect, however, that we agree on the fundamentals. There's some cost and risk to developing and trying to maintain any code base, and accepting that can usefully inform development and operations work better than thinking of code as a (near-)risk-free asset.

kweinber 7y ago

The accounting world considers code an asset and allows you to amortize its creation. Making progress in the world is fighting against entropy. Just because it is hard to fight the disorganizing efforts of the universe doesn’t mean that your output is a liability.

RickSanchez2600 7y ago

Code is a liability it can be hacked if not written securely. It can be out of date if the language changes or Windows changes and the company upgrades, which means parts of it need to be rewritten. I used to program COBOL on IBM 370 DOS/VSE systems they later went to Visual BASIC on Window 3.1 PCs. The conversion took a long time and most code had to be rewritten because COBOL is not BASIC. Management didn't care about that, they just wanted a working project. We all did our best going overtime without pay and working weekends to meet deadlines. COBOL was a liability when they wanted to convert to Visual BASIC. There was liability to convert the code, convert from DB2 to SQL Server on the database end.

dfilppi 7y ago
Overtime without pay is financial debt.